Advocating for the right of consenting adults to share and enjoy love, sex, residence, and marriage without limits on the gender, number, or relation of participants. Full marriage equality is a basic human right.

Tuesday, August 30, 2016

Erica Parise/SHOWTIMEIf you're watching Ray Donovan and not caught up with season 4, be advised this posting has SPOILERS below.

Visibility matters. Unfortunately, there aren't many realistic portrayals good consanguinamorous relationships in current media.

I hadn't been paying attention to this series, but there were characters who were half-siblings who were having sex. Given the themes and settings of the series, it isn't surprising that the characters are not exactly model citizens. Hector and Marisol are the characters of particular interest to this blog.

Facebook Messenger happened and it got to the point where we were
talking every day. And after about a year, I kind of developed feelings
for her romantically—I felt it was mutual, but I did not dare ask.

Because it took so long, it probably doesn't fall under GSA or at least not a "typical" example of it, although the lack of a Westermarck Effect is still involved.

And
then somebody from the family got sick and she decided to visit, she
said she wanted to see our place, too.

I can’t recall what happened but at some point during her stay, we
kissed each other. And it was the best kiss I have had in my life.

Wednesday, August 24, 2016

She starts out explaining that she and her boyfriend of three years have fantasized about nonmonogamy, which is a very common area of fantasy, but they've done something that not as common, but by no means rare... actually opening up their relationship.

Being that we were both brand new to the idea of opening up our
relationship, we sort of went into the whole thing holding hands. He
chose someone on Tinder and sent me screenshots of her profile for
approval. I made sure to set some very clearly defined sexual
boundaries, most importantly that our “third party candidate” knew about
me and the agreement that my boyfriend and I had. The night of, he
texted me before he left to meet her, when he arrived at the
destination, and when the deed was done.

All very reasonable and good things.

From the moment I brought up the idea, the chemistry
between us had intensified and the morning after the whole event felt as
though it was reaching boiling point.

Tuesday, August 23, 2016

We recently noted that a judge in Kenya pointed out that Kenya does not have laws criminalizing sex between cousins. To follow up on that news, Ruth Nyambura at allafrica.com collected opinions against the court finding from people who aren't lawyers, judges, or legislators. Seems legit.

First up to say the judge, who made a legally (and ethically) connect ruling, got it wrong is a chaplain...

Daystar
University's Chaplain Jeremiah Obura said a lot of what is happening is
out of influence from the western culture where they do all sorts of
weird things and people copy for the sake of it.

He quoted the Bible
the book of Leviticus Chapter 18 verse six which states: "No one is to
approach any close relative to have sexual relations, I am the Lord.
There is no debate on this issue. Based on the scriptures it is not
right and it rules out."

1. I was unaware that present-day Kenya is ancient Israel, subject to the laws of ancient Israel. If so, well, there's a whole lot of other laws I'm sure Obura is breaking.

2. In those laws for ancient Israel, prohibitions on cousins getting together are NOT THERE. If this guy bothers to read his Bible, he knows that.

3. The Bible, subsequent to this passage, depicts marriages between cousins in a positive light.

Monday, August 22, 2016

It is irksome to see the title "Escaping Polygamy." I know many people who could say they escaped monogamy, escaped marriage, etc. Abusers are someone to escape. A relationship construct is only something to be escaped for someone who isn't suited for it. For example, if you're polyamorous, it can be rather painful to be coerced into a monogamous relationship with no hope of polyamory.

A polygynous man taking sisters as wives is not all that unusual. However, I can understand that if someone really doesn't want to be in a polygynous marriage, or doesn't want to be in one with her sister, that it could be a terrible way to live. Nobody should be pressured into a relationship they don't want. Part of having full marriage equality and relationship rights for all is allowing people to be themselves. This will allow people to have the relationships they want, including not having a legal, romantic, or sexual relationship at all.

The wrong kind of sisterly bond. Escaping Polygamy's Lorie opens up about the pain of sharing her husband with a blood relative in the Sunday, August 21, episode, as seen in Us Weekly's exclusive sneak peek.

The wrong kind of sisterly bond for her. For other women, sharing a partner with their sibling is something to which they aspire.

The A&E unscripted
series' preview clip shows Lorie telling the camera that she has 10
children with husband Verl, who she married when she was 17. Verl was
already married to Lorie's older sister, and the two of them have 15
kids together. (Verl also has six kids with a third wife, who is his
half-sister.)

They all belong to the polygamist Salt Lake City–based
Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

Is the problem here really polygamy, or rather something about the FLDS? Consider what the article says next...

'Escaping Polygamy' Star Lorie

"My mom walked out of our life when I was 9, and [my
sister] took the role of a mother, and she really felt strongly that I
needed to be a part of her family," Lorie explains. "She would tell me
that she felt like if I didn't do this, then I would lose my eternal
salvation."

So tell me how this would relate to the polygamous freedom to marry under a system of gender equality in which people are truly free to not marry and to marry the person or people they want to marry?

At the moment it is a crime punishable for up to seven years in prison.

Do you think it is an outdated law?

It's a ridiculous and unjust law.

If three+ people could prove they are happy in the arrangement, would this change your mind?

Visibility is important, but this is a basic matter of freedom of association. People have a fundamental right to marry. Some people are polyamorous or otherwise want more than one spouse. If all are consenting adults, there's no good reason to deny them their rights. You don't need to be aware of the polyamorous people around you who are in happy, long-term relationships to understand that all adults should have their rights.

Monday, August 15, 2016

Ignorance abounds when it comes to sex and marriage between first cousins. Your first cousin is your parent's sibling's child. In many places in the world, and for most of human history, marriage between first cousins has been a common thing. There are, however, places where such marriages face discrimination, including criminalization. The US, where this blog is based, is a mixed bag because each state has their own laws. As such, about half of the states (some with restrictions) will marry first cousins, a handful of the others will criminally prosecute first cousins for having sex, and the remainder of the states neither criminalize sex between first cousins nor will marry first cousins.

If you didn’t know, it’s okay for cousins to have sexual relationships in Kenya!
Apparently Kenyan law hasn’t criminalized sexual relationships
between cousins; high court ruling on an ‘incestuous’ relationship has
stunned the nation.

High Court judge James Makau found that the Sexual Offenses Act did
not mention cousins among the list of relatives under the offence of
incest.

So it's legal. Apparently, some courts were not aware of what the law says and doesn't say, which is a problem.

Reading his ruling in a case where a woman took her nephew to
court for having sex with her daughter, Makau stated that sex and
marriages between cousins was permissible because there are no
provisions for it in the law.

“The National Assembly did not leave out the clause on cousins by
intension but by the fact that in some cultures in Kenya, like the
Hundus and Muslims, allow sexual acts and marriage between cousins. It
is not criminalized,” The Standard quoted the high court judge.

I think a better question is whether or not it is a problem. I don't think it is inherently a problem. However, because it is so powerful, it can be a problem given certain circumstances:

1. Not reciprocated. Unrequieted love or attraction is painful.

2. Acting on focusing on the attraction violates existing vows to another, or otherwise damages an existing relationship. A common example is a married person with vows of monogamy becomes distracted or cheats.

3. A non-sexual relationship is a higher priority ("I want a brother") and sex is seen as a threat to that.

4. Acting would be a violation of the law. Rejection by others.

#4 should no longer be true when it comes to adults. It is ridiculous to have laws against consensual adult sex, and we should not reject our friends and family for such a thing, either. #3 is a little more flexible. If one is the kind of person who can be friends with past lovers, there shouldn't be a concern. By exploring the sexual side of the relationship, there is a lot that can be gained and less of a chance anything will be lost.

A
mother and son whose forbidden love affair could land them each a
lengthy jail sentence have declared they are 'madly in love' and nothing
will tear them apart.

Monica
Mares, 36, and her son Caleb Peterson, 19, face up to 18 months in
prison if found guilty of incest at a trial later this year in New
Mexico.

Prison... for being consenting adults who love each other. It really doesn't matter how many people find this disgusting or shocking. The basic question is, should consenting adults be denied their fundamental right to be together?

Thursday, August 11, 2016

With news of Monica and Caleb's love and unjust prosecution (and Genetic Sexual Attraction) going viral, it was expected that the professional columnists and bloggers who make their living repeating how important they think it is it is for everyone to live under their particular religious rules would pile on along with the knuckle-dragging haters.

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

Imagine a man and woman meet in a bar. They've never met before. They go
outside for a smoke. They get into an argument and the jerk slugs her.

That is assault. But is
it domestic violence?

No? What if I told you that unbeknownst to them,
they have the same genetic father, a sperm donor neither one has met?

Is
it domestic violence then? No?

What if... instead of slugging her, he wasn't a jerk and instead
romanced her for the evening and they ended up having passionate sex.

Is that incest?

You can say it is incest biologically, but not sociologically. They were not raised together. They aren't even aware they are related yet.

Things like this have happened. Some people who experience Genetic Sexual Attraction had no idea they were genetically related before they met, fell in love, had sex, or even had children together. Even so, people ignorant of GSA or Genetic Attraction are scoffing at the defendant's statement in this case. Granted, they were apparently aware of their relation before their relationship involved statutory rape (since the age of consent in California is 18, not 16, as it is in many US states.) But that GSA happens to people unaware of their genetic relation demonstrates that GSA is real.

Judgmental finger-waggers cite the genetic connection as to why this is incest. This is because "she raised him" is not an option for why they are upset. The finger-waggers like to use that one when, say, a man and his grown stepdaughter have sexual relationship. Some finger-waggers go even further. Let's say that instead of starting a relationship with his grown stepdaughter, his son, whom the stepdaughter never lived with, meets her as an adult and starts a relationship with her. Some of the finger-waggers still say this is wrong, even if the man is no longer married to her mother.

People would use just about any argument to condemn a relationship with which they are not comfortable. But we'd all be a lot better off if we put aside our prejudices and recognized that consenting adults should be free to share love, sex, residence, and marriage. Even if someone is disgusted. We'd also be better off if we recognized that Genetic Sexual Attraction does exist, and it is a mitigating factor when, say, a 32 year-old woman breaks California's age of consent barrier with a 16 year-old.

The problem with calling the Atkinson case incest is that incest conjures up images of (in this case) a woman grooming the boy she is raising to be her assault victim. This is a case of Genetic Sexual Attraction and statutory rape. She did not raise him. She was not his guardian. This was a case where one of the participants was not a legal adult, able to legally consent. When the participants are consenting adults, I prefer the term consanguinamory to distinguish loving, consensual sex from images of some vile old man raping an prepubescent girl. Rape and love are not the same things.

There is no good reason why adults who are not violating existing vows to others, who are right for each other, should feel a need to refrain from being together in whatever way they want. Unfortunately, laws and prejudices in many places still need to catch up with reality. But what about finding support from others in the same situation?

Genetic Sexual Attraction is a phenomenon that may or may
not actually lead to sex. However, if sex is involved, it is not incest from
the sociological perspective, but still may be considered incest by outsiders,
including law enforcement, as it is incest in the genetic sense. It is very easy for people who haven't experience GSA or witnessed it happening first-hand to scoff and deny it's reality. But ignorance does not determine reality. For more, read this.

Sunday, August 7, 2016

Thanks to psychologytoday.com for continuing to feature good content respecting polyamorous families and individuals. Elisabeth Sheff, Ph.D had another good writeup there, titled "Fear of the Polyamorous Possibility." It is about why some people feel threatened by polyamory. [This entry is being bumped up.]

There are three common reactions, she says, to the realization that polyamory is a possibility. You'll have to click through if you want to read about those, but I wanted to note that she explains why there is the potential of a much larger percentage of the population having polyamorous relationships.

Among
forms of sexual nonconformity, polyamory is unusual in that it could
potentially be appealing to everyone who desires intimate relationships
with other people. Most people are heterosexual, and it is readily
apparent that not every one experiences same-sex sexual attraction or
desire. In other words, not everyone has the capacity or desire to be
gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Unless they are monogamous by orientation,
however, most people in long-term relationships -- regardless of sexual
orientation -- have had the experience of being attracted to someone
else besides their partner. Almost everyone has the potential to be
polyamorous in a way that many people do not have that same potential to
be gay.

Just about anyone who has been in a long-term relationship, no matter how happy they have been in that relationship, has experienced a desire for, or daydream of, doing something with someone that might not be considered appropriate, and not because they want to betray or hurt the other person in the relationship, but because they find this "third" person fascinating, attractive, or they share something in common. It doesn't have to be sexual. It could be an emotional connection, or simply wanting to share some recreational experience. It could be going to a concert, or hiking and camping in a specific spot, a mutual interest in a style of dance or cuisine. Or, it could be entirely sexual, or romantic, or emotional. There are so very many ways that polyamory can be experienced, and many people who don't need polyamory can still want and enjoy at least a season in which they have more than one relationship, without lying or sneaking around.

Despite the claims of some bigots, adopting the same-gender freedom to marry and eliminating other forms of prejudice against LGBT people does not make one more person gay or lesbian. Removing discrimination against ethical nonmonogamy, and especially adopting the polygamous freedom to marry, will mean more people will enjoy polyamory, because you don't have to need polyamory to enjoy polyamory.

If you read about polyamory in
the media, you’ve probably seen The Photo: an image of three (or more)
pairs of adult feet at the end of a bed, poking out from under a white
duvet.

YES! That seems to be the image used more than any other. The other one is looking at three people sitting on a bench, from behind, with the two people on the end holding hands "behind the back" of the person in the middle, in a way that implies cheating.

Tuesday, August 2, 2016

In the US, with high disapproval percentages for both of the major party nominees for President more people are considering voting Libertarian. Now, not all Libertarian Party members are truly libertarian, and not all libertarians are the same. Also, not all libertarians are Libertarian Party members. Anyway, Matthew James Norris is "an aspiring British historian and philosopher, with additional interests
in political theory, economics, and contemporary affairs" and at beinglibertarian.com he wrote an essay taking a libertarian approach to laws criminalizing consanguinamory.

I am a conservative Baptist. I believe extra-marital sex is morally
wrong, and that same-sex marriage is illegitimate. I believe
prostitution and incest are morally reprehensible.

However, in spite of my personal sentiments, I believe all of the
above should be legal, albeit with some qualifiers. Why? Because, as Ron
Paul so candidly put it, “we as individuals are responsible for our own
lives and decisions.” Indeed, that statement is one to which all
Baptists should subscribe.

See? It is possible to say something isn't for you, or that you think others shouldn't do it, without trying to stop other people from doing it.

The fear, then, is that by speaking out in favour of incest
being legal (even with some caveats) you open yourself up to the charge
that you have some sort of Oedipal complex, that you are a motherfu-…you
get the idea.

Yes, yes, I believe people off all races should have their rights, which means I want to be each of those races, right?

The point is that there is a near universal taboo about
incest. However, libertarians must not let that fear prevent us
advocating reforms that will increase liberty.

I wouldn't say it is near universal. It is a common taboo, to be sure.

Does romantic and/or sexual love between relatives cause physical
harm to others against their will? I cannot imagine a situation in which
that is so. At most, the parties involved could harm themselves in the
act, but that is of no concern to the libertarian – it is merely an
unfortunate consequence of their own consensual choices.

Full Marriage Equality

About This Blog

I argue for marriage equality. By that I mean that society and all local, state, federal, and international laws, institutions, and programs should recognize any marriage registered by any persons without restrictions on the basis of race, color, creed, ancestry, national origin, sex, gender, sexual orientation, or religion.

The global definition of marriage should be as follows: "The uniting of consenting individuals in a witnessed ceremony."

We believe everyone has the right to share love, sex, residence, and marriage with any and all consenting adult(s) of their choice, regardless of birth or sexual orientation.

The Fine Print

The focus of this blog is consenting adults. This blog does not advocate anyone engage in activity that is currently illegal in their jurisdiction; it does advocate changing or repealing any law that prevents the freedom of association, love, and full marriage equality for adults. This blog condemns rape, sexual assault, and child molestation, and frowns in the general direction of cheating. This blog exists mainly to evaluate information and direct others to information about current events; it does not provide medical, therapeutic, legal, financial, or cooking advice. This blog links to other sites for informational purposes; it does not necessarily support everything at those links.